NaPM April 06 2016

[milo]

Rules: Write a poem for national poetry month on the topic or form described. Each poem should appear as a separate reply to this thread. The goal is to, at the end of the month have written 30 poems for National Poetry Month. 


Topic 06: Weeded would like to see a poem inspired by the euphoria of the first time you do something (sex, love, drugs, poetry) or possibly inspired by the longing for  recapturing that feeling of the first time
Form : any
Line requirements: 8 lines or more

Questions?

[just mercedes]

After Sappho 31

He attracts my attention
like a magnet, whenever
he arrives. He listens
carefully to my songs, as if
he cares. When he teases me
my voice stumbles.

On the street when we meet
I’m tongue-tied, too shy to speak.
My skin flushes red,
my eyesight blurs. Distressed
I hear drums in my ears
and I tremble and sweat.

The first time, dizzy, almost fainting,
I thought I was going to die
right then and there. The world
went black. I have to try
to remember that thing
about cats and kings.

[Achebe]

The first time I saw God

The first time I saw God I thought I had died
I was like 'God, is that you?' and he was like 'Yeah man, whatever'
in an Indian accent, and that's when I realised that the fucker was Indian –
full blooded Sioux, I mean, and this made me think
'How do I know what the Sioux sound like? I haven't even been to the States.'

Soon after, he opened a Koran, which pissed me off,
this demonstrated disbelief in Jesus,
and marked up the squiggly text, edits
for the end of the World.
Once in a while He'd look at me, as if to ask the meaning of Arabic words no longer spoken and probably a copying error anyway
then He'd look away.
I thought of putting out my doobie, my very first doobie,
but it had cost me some, and I smoked it until the terrapin
with hurt eyes replaced Him suddenly when I looked away, then back,
and since then I have searched again and again in vain, rain
for the soul's dry solitude, my rack, my rod.
But that was the only time I saw God.

Note: I hope I haven't unconsciously lifted L2 from some other pome - let me know if I have. Sometimes it's hard to distinguish between your thoughts at an earlier time, and just something you've read before. The second last line is probably stolen unconsciously from Hopkins (or from an earlier poem of mine in imitation of Hopkins!!), but I can't place it and have left it as it is.

[billy]

sorry guys [i'm trying ]

The wow factor

There's a tea, four strips, two eggs and a slice;
the Bacon is wavy, rippled and crisp
The eggs are't snotty, they're sunny and nice
A smidgen of salt; the pepper a wisp.

A side of mushrooms, an order of beans
two or three hashbrowns and red sauce of course.
Hold the tomatoes,they don't suit my genes.
I'm so fuckin' hungry, pass me a horse.

[bedeep]

Achebe, that's wonderful! I'm going to have to do some version of that idea (but not for this prompt) -- I can feel it tickling around in the back brain.

Billy, it's way too early for all that food.

I'll be back with something for today after coffee here.

[Tracy Mitchell]

Euphoric Indeedy    

A-OK it is, aces for certain
astonishing, astounding
    a
    w
    e
    s
    o
    m
    e
and that’s just the A’s.

B-B-B-Breathtaking,
           cool [hot]
                  – a doozie

    extravagant
          fab and groovy.

My tongue incinerates,
taste buds explode.

Who knew hot cheese would
so much please?  

What is this . . . pizza?

[Achebe]

Achebe, that's wonderful! I'm going to have to do some version of that idea (but not for this prompt) -- I can feel it tickling around in the back brain.

Billy, it's way too early for all that food.

I'll be back with something for today after coffee here.

thanks, bedeep - look forward to your take on it!

[heslopian]

The Incantation

It happened in my grandmother's loft.

I don't recall
why I stayed there that night,
though she was
like a cave to which I'd crawl,
her beige carpets,
her hotel-lobby portraits
(of couples dining on the promenade,
and watering-cans
overflowing with flowers),
and that small, warm loft,
a place apart from time and space,
as my teenage self understood those concepts.

I must admit: it wasn't really the first time
I'd picked up a book of poems and read it,
but in hindsight it feels like it was.

The poem I remember reading
was about a lone woman walking through a garden
as the sun filleted her, her arms outstretched
like a religious ascetic's, the light becoming her.

The light became me, and I floated
slightly above the bed,
trembling in the dooryard
of a strange old world.

---

@just mercedes - This poem was very sensual and rhythmic, and kind of stream-of-consciousness. I envy your ability to cut and establish flow like that!

@Achebe - This poem was hilarious As soon as you started using "like" in that context, I was like, "okay, I love this".

@billy - I should not be as turned on by this poem as I am... Srsly, tho, you apologise for it, but it's actually got a strong flow and voice.

@Teagan - Another really funny one! I read these poems aloud, and when I got to the cheese line I had to stop to laugh

[Keith]

Two go on their first adventure

Passporte,
said the sombre night desk
without looking up from its book.
The huge key took us to a tired room
so we climbed in bed.
Wake up! sleepy head,
squealing like a school girl chased by monsters
she threw back the blinds,
I caught them with my open eye,
aqua blues and gold Majorcan hues
white-washed into the room,
we floated on the shimmer.

Hopping into shorts and tee’s
we glided down the marble stairs
“Ola” as she swept.
The pool sparkled and giggled through my squint
to the sound of dragged plastic.
I shared my sun bed with Clive Barker,
snorkeled with Jacque Cousteau
walked in pine forests so quiet we could hear ourselves
and feasted on fish with eyes.

We sophisticated each sunset
dressed white under bougainvillea,
fragrant as the wine.
Growing like my fingernails
for the very first time.

[cidermaid]

ugh - it is hard to write about euphoria when you are feeling depressed.

Head down,
the waters departed
as you pierced a breach
through bone lined canal gates;
with your blue, blue eyes
open to the world to come.

I felt them move.
A soft exquisite pain,
tearing aside
the last vestige child,
so that the mother in me
could hold her firstborn.

[Keith]

It may have been hard to write AJ but the poem is delightful, hope you find something to cheer you up a litre of wine usually does it for me

---

just mercedes - I admire the passion you squeeze into the poem its as smooth as a caress, wonderful to read out load.

---

Achebe I love the voice in this one really fresh and kept my interest throughout very witty.

---

Billy excellent, what can I say you made me hungry...for more

---

Very witty Teagan I didn't smell the pizza cooking so it was a nice surprise, really like the layout and rhymes

[bedeep]

Every poem here is a delight to read. I am learning so much from each of you. Cidermaid, *hugs*, it really is a lovely piece you wrote, may it lift your spirits.

Here's mine for today:

That Time Santa Claus Taught Me To Fly

He bought it used
and painted it blue.
It stood under the tree
the year I was seven.

With him much was easy
and so with this.
He held me steady
and walked while I peddled.

Then gave a push, shouting,
"Go! Peddle faster!
"Turn left! Now right!"
I wobbled, he caught me,

no training wheels ever
as safe as those arms,
no pony as fine as
that blue bike of mine.

[Keith]

Jack Im lovin your poetry, this one made me want to write, such a perfect set up and vivid experience, seriously well done.

---

very nice bedeep, I very nearly wrote about the same thing, glad I didn't yours is much better.

[bedeep]

Thank you, Keith. I particularly loved your use of "sophisticated" as a verb. A perfect touch.

[cidermaid]

Thanks bedeep, I haven't written anything much over the last year and nearly didn't bother trying to join in. Really glad I did, enjoying the ride and reading all the other poems and listening to all the chat has made me remember just how brilliant this site is.
The quality of writing from everyone has been a joy to read, simply love all the different takes on the same theme. AJ.

Kieth - can't afford wine right now. Might have to resort to drinking the profits and take to the cider.

[Todd]

The First Time God Speaks to You

It won’t be like the preachers tell you.
As they strut, confident as college boys
with their father into the whorehouse
of their own imaginings.
God is not concerned
with a back ache in South Carolina,
nor does He speak in the voice
of your wife through a radio transmitter.

If light is simply His self-revelation,
and at a word galaxies spun out stars
like an explosion of so many dying fireflies,
and if breath from His anthropomorphic lungs
filled our lungs, so that we would also speak
and be His image in resounding echo,
than when we hear His whisper, the infinite
will settle on our tongue like a brand, unquenchable.

I found it to be like an envelope torn open,
its contents spilled out--a forgotten detail
never learned, like a string
never tied to an invisible finger.

There was only the name of a stranger,
her life broke open like a piece of fruit,
a half-brother, my likely schizophrenia,
and the pressure to write it all down.

The next day I found, she existed, Ex nilhio,
like a conjuror's trick. Her situation a book
I had already read, and the world became
a wobbly top unable to return to its axis
of silence, no matter how I covered my ears.

[Tracy Mitchell]

Geez, Todd! Gorgeous stuff!

[QDeathstar]

Mushroom Pizza

The fire speaks to me
It is happy. It breathes deeply, and I
do. Slowly like time, and time-
I and the fire hear the gears
in the clock grind releasing frustration
in one thunderous TOCK!

The clock is angry with the fire
and me, because we are content
and time is alone.

[Leanne]

Sunrise

Perfectionism does not lend itself much
to euphoric moments. Every first is flawed,
and every retry admits fault.

My voice sounds like her voice now. At least
I try to say different words, but even in that
I fail. My milestones were cracked, mazed
with veins of disdain, disapproval, her presence,
then his. His was worse, because I chose it.

He took from me a wedding day, births
of children, bright hours and best years.
When I closed that door, his voice remained;
hers returned.

Then I heard yours, and it was louder.
You spoke to me of joy and I believed you. Let
it in, strange and new. You saw the cracks
and didn't add to them, just nodded and carved
new stones. Each touch, still, is a thrill I never
thought to feel.

Every first breaks bonds to the past. I welcome
every sunrise as the first time
I will spend that day with you.

[Todd]

"Every first breaks bonds to the past."

That's a good truth, Leanne. I can empathize with perfectionism and awful firsts. Enjoyed the read.

~~
Oh, thank you Teagan.